Implications of Myelin in Executive Control in Adolescence and Early Adulthood

Launched by CENTRE HOSPITALIER ST ANNE · Mar 7, 2025

Keywords

ClinConnect Summary

The Myelex study is a research project that aims to understand how a part of the brain called myelin affects thinking and decision-making in teenagers and young adults. Myelin is a protective layer around nerve fibers that helps information travel quickly in the brain. This study will use a painless imaging technique called Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) to look at the brain's structure while also assessing how well participants can think and make decisions. Researchers believe that understanding the relationship between myelin and cognitive control—skills that help us solve problems and make choices—could be important for academic and career success.

To participate in this study, individuals aged 10 to 25 years who speak French and are right-handed may be eligible. Participants will undergo an MRI scan and complete some cognitive tasks, which together will take about 3.5 hours. It's important to note that certain conditions, such as having a pacemaker or being pregnant, may disqualify someone from participating. This study is taking place at the Clinical Research Center of GHU Paris, and all participants, or their legal guardians, must provide consent to join.

Gender

ALL

Eligibility criteria

• Inclusion Criteria:
• • Male or female; Subject aged 10 to 25 years; Right-handed preference; Subject, or legal representative, who has given consent to participate; Native language: French; Subject affiliated with a social security system; Having signed their consent to participate (and their legal representative if applicable), subjects and parents have read the information letter and given their free and informed consent. In cases where only one parent gives consent (for minors), this must be justified (such as no contact with the other parent for over a year).
• Exclusion Criteria:
• • Not corresponding to the targeted age range;
• • Subject with contraindications to an MRI examination (pacemaker or neurosensory stimulator or implantable defibrillator, cochlear implants, ferromagnetic foreign bodies in the eyes or brain near neural structures, metal prostheses, patient agitation: non-cooperative or agitated patients, minors, claustrophobic subjects, pregnant women, ventriculoperitoneal neurosurgical shunt valves, dental braces);
• • Subject with chronic alcohol or drug use;
• • Abuse or dependence on substances (except nicotine) or toxic substances for more than 5 years or having led to comas (overdoses);
• • Subject with sudden-onset cognitive disorders that could indicate a stroke; a history of head trauma with loss of consciousness for more than 1 hour, or encephalitis;
• • Subject with chronic neurological, psychiatric, endocrine, hepatic, or infectious conditions;
• • Subject with a history of major illness (diabetes, chronic lung disease, severe cardiac, metabolic, hematological, endocrine, or immunological disorder, cancer);
• • Subject on medication: taking medications likely to interfere with brain imaging measurements (psychotropics, anxiolytic hypnotics, neuroleptics, anti-Parkinsonians, benzodiazepines, steroidal anti-inflammatories, antiepileptics, central analgesics, and muscle relaxants);
• • Color blindness;
• • Inability to comply with the study for geographical or psychiatric reasons;
• • Tattoo incompatible with MRI;
• • Cerebral palsy;
• • Fine motor skills disorder;
• • Pregnant women at the time of inclusion;
• • Adult subjects under legal protection or unable to give consent (article L.1121-8 of the French Public Health Code) (under guardianship or curatorship);
• • Children and parents under legal protection measures